Ascendancy Player Expansion Coming Soon

The Ferengi are coming to Gale Force Nine’s Star Trek: Ascendancy

Unlike other societies in the game, Ferengi eschew traditional “cultural advancement” in favor of the pursuit of profit. The Special Rules for the Ferengi player reinforce this by preventing Ferengi from building Culture Nodes. These rules also allow them to build profitable Production Nodes in lieu of a planet’s standard resource capacity and permitting them to purchase Culture Tokens at a cost of five Production Tokens each. For the Ferengi, profit is Culture.

The player expansion contains all of the game pieces required to play as the Ferengi Alliance, including a Ferengi Control Console, 30 Ferengi Starships, and a deck of Ferengi Rules of Acquisition Cards. Other Civilizations devote tremendous resources to scientific and cultural advancements by means of their Advancement Cards whereas the Ferengi spend resources to add to the wisdom that has guided their civilization for centuries, the venerated Rules of Acquisition. Unique Ferengi Fleet Cards and Markers, Special Trade Agreement Cards and Ferengi Control Nodes round out the player’s components. The expansion also includes extra Resource Node game pieces, game tokens and space lanes.

Of course, the Ferengi Alliance expansion includes ten new Systems to exploit, including the Ferengi homeworld of Ferenginar. Players may also visit the twin worlds of Straleb Madena and the desolate planetoid Rog. Two new phenomena are also introduced in this expansion, including the Mutara Nebula. Starships entering the Mutara Nebula will find that their Shields are useless, evening the odds in any space combat that may occur there.

The Ferengi Alliance expansion introduces a new card type to the Exploration Card Deck, Allies. When an Ally card is drawn, a player has found a faction or person open to establishing an agreement if the player can pass a Diplomacy Test. New to this expansion, a Diplomacy Test is passed when the player rolls a die and adds their Ascendancy to the result, if the total is higher that the Diplomacy Number printed on the card, the test is passed and the Ally’s Special Rule goes into effect. Every player has a chance to encounter and negotiate with Allies in the game.

Look for both the Ferengi Alliance Player Expansion and Cardassian Union Player Expansion in stores later this year. GF9’ Star Trek: Ascendancy will be in general release in game and hobby stores this October.

For a full accounting of the Ferengi Alliance, visit Gale Force Nine at www.startrek.gf9games.com. In the following weeks GF9 will offer an in-depth audit of the new components found in the expansion, including the new Systems Discs, the special Ferengi Trade Agreements and the new Ally Exploration Cards.